


Photographs and Phone Screens

by livy_bear



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Bisexual Bucky Barnes, Bisexual Steve Rogers, Communication, Fluff, M/M, Minor Peggy Carter/Steve Rogers, Mutual Pining, Pre-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Sappy, but also cacw never happens because of good, the rest of the avengers too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-10
Updated: 2018-04-10
Packaged: 2019-04-21 00:27:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14272896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livy_bear/pseuds/livy_bear
Summary: "Bucky was leaning closer. His whole right side was already pressed shoulder-to-ankle against Steve. He wondered how it would feel to press even closer together. Bucky’s eyes were intense. “You’re so beautiful all the time, I—”He stopped. God, he stopped. He couldn’t say it, couldn’t get his mouth to make the words.He seemed to know. Steve hoped he knew. By the way Bucky’s eyes widened fractionally and his whole body froze. Oh god, oh no."--Based on a thought I had that whatever someone has as their home and lock screen can pinpoint something that's important to them. It snowballed from there.(Looks like I accidentally posted this twice! Sorry!!)





	Photographs and Phone Screens

Steve adjusted to his new place in time…slowly. He didn’t like the new more electronic music—though it was interesting, it was a little too foreign to his ears. Musicians that used full bands, he liked those. He couldn’t quite get over how fast elevators moved now, or the ones that tell him his floor as he goes up. He wasn’t sure he liked fast food, but figured it was nice that folks could get an alright-meal; instead of trying to live off of one bag of rice and a loaf of bread when they were dirt poor.

Probably the worst thing, the hardest thing, the  _most amazing_ thing was computers. It was good that knowledge was so easily accessible, Steve knew that was doing good to stop a lot of sorts of ignorance from taking over again. His “Rehabilitation and Emersion” team had shown him pictures, of what computers had looked like right after he’d gone into the ice. Huge behemoths of things, with whole rooms devoted to them, running so hot that walking in would have been like a sauna. And now…god,  _now_  they were so portable and small, Fury had one in his pocket. Hell, Steve had one in his pocket too. Coulson had given it to him after informing him that it wasn’t just a computer but a  _phone_  as well.

“This is a phone?” Steve had asked, pointing to the black rectangle resting in his hand.

“Yes, Captain,” Coulson’s smile was probably meant to look less patronizing. “You press and hold this button on the side,” he did, “and it turns on. You can pick a passcode if you like; so others can’t get in if you leave it out or lose it.” Coulson paused. “There’s even an option to erase all data on the phone if the passcode is entered incorrectly too many times in a row.”

Steve blinked. That seemed a little drastic. Then he thought about how Coulson worked for SHEILD and how they were government agency. “Show me how.”

Coulson did, and Steve promptly set his passcode as 0310.

For at least a month, Steve didn’t have anything very exciting as his wallpaper. It stayed the preset background. Why would he change it? He barely knew how the camera worked; nothing he had taken was good enough to work as a background. He had moved to a SHEILD safe house, then an apartment back in New York and still hadn’t managed to take a photo that wasn’t a little out of focus or badly framed. He got a really nice one of a squirrel, but he hesitated before setting it as his background. It was good, and less empty than the gray default background. He kept it.

He knew people had friends or family as backgrounds but all of his were…well. Peggy Carter and Agent Coulson were the only numbers stored in his phone. He had zero call logs.

Then the Battle of Manhattan happened. And suddenly Steve had…people again. He hadn’t actually spent too much time with them up in the air. He thought he liked Banner the most. He was smart kind, and  _safe_  in a way Steve thought the 21st century didn’t allow for. But then he met the Other Guy and was much more aware of how hard Banner must work to remain as gentle as he was. Gentle may be the wrong word. Good. Banner was a  _good man_. Steve respected him.

It was Natasha and Tony that hit chords with him, though. They were both so…loud in their own ways. Tony was loud audibly and physically, and Natasha was so determined and self assured and  _capable_ , even her quiet movements screamed at Steve. There was no way to not be aware that she was in the room (except when she didn’t want you too know). Both of them threw out the idea of easing Steve into the new century by taking him to every restaurant with food from places Steve had never thought of before (Tony), or by downloading a bunch of apps he “absolutely needs—yes, you  _do,_  Steve” to his phone (Natasha). Natasha even—somehow, Lord knows—hacked into his account and named his phone for him.

“Joe?” He asked, holding up the device in question.

“I thought it fit.” She shrugged. “We could call him Jack instead, if you prefer.”

“No, I—Natasha, it’s a  _phone_.” Steve protested.

He thought he saw the corner of her mouth twitch upward. “That doesn’t mean he can’t have a name,  _Steve_.”

He sighed, but didn't change it.

Steve found himself spending more time at Stark Tower. It was hard to be sad about the ghosts of your life, your city, when Tony Stark is babbling on at you about making his Iron Man suit possibly durable in space. He had the stunning talent Howard shared as well to talk even if whoever was with you wasn’t fully listening. It was comforting to lose himself in the pitches and tones of Tony’s voice, nodding along even though Steve still wasn’t sure exactly what an Arc Reactor was.

Steve wanted to draw him. He hadn’t gotten the urge to draw in a long time, but watching Tony go on about something that clearly meant a lot to him made Steve’s fingers itch. It was inspiring. Seeing Tony and Pepper interacting actually had Steve buying a sketch pad, some pens and pencils, still down and draw the two of them. It reminded him of how the Barnes parents used to talk with each other, light teasing and scolding, but every so often smiling privately at each other. And that had Steve drawing George and Winifred. Which of course lead to him wanting to draw Becca, Ruthie, and Evelyn. Then all he wanted to draw was—

Natasha caught him one day, sitting alone in the tower and sketching the skyline.

“I didn’t know you were an artist.” She said, sitting next to him.

“What, the textbooks don’t mention it?” He smiled wryly.

“I wouldn’t know. I grew up in Russia,” she met his eye. Steve immediately felt bad. Natasha had mentioned it before, he should have  _remembered_. “You been to the MoMA recently?” She cut through his thoughts.

“I haven’t been to the MoMA ever.” He shuffled a bit on the couch. “We—I was too poor back when it opened. Then the war and… I never got around to it.”

Natasha considered him for a moment. “C’mon. Get up. We’re taking a day trip to the art museums.”

“Museum _s_?”

“Yes, museum _s,_ ” she almost laughed. “I assume you like The Met?”

He did.

He loved it, he really did. They spent the whole day going from exhibit to exhibit in both museums. Natasha took plenty of pictures on her phone, and goaded Steve into taking a few on his phone as well. In front of some of the painting, Natasha would pose like the people in them and insist Steve take the picture. She even managed to get Steve to join her in one, asking a nice young lady to take the picture for them.

He felt ridiculous, and he somehow knew this wasn't how Natasha usually was either. But he also felt happy. Well, happier than he’d been wasting away by himself in the woods. Natasha even got a few genuine smiles out of him during.

“Hey, AirDrop some of those to me,” She insisted, when they were going through them at the end of the day.

“Air what?” Steve blinked, imagining for a second parachutes and the Italian mountainside. But, no, this was a phone thing.

“AirDrop, here, give me your phone.” She took his phone and paused. “Rogers, is your background a squirrel?” He flushed but didn’t say anything. She didn’t spend more than a second looking at him before going back to his phone and doing  _something_  with both hers and his. When she handed it back he had fifteen more photos in his album.

“Thank you.” He said earnestly. Natasha waved him off, and took the subway with him home. He was worried about how she would get home, but she insisted it wasn’t anything he had to worry about.

“I’ll be fine,” she insisted. “But I’ll text you when I’m home safe. How does that sound, Captain?”

“Good, thank you.”

It wasn’t until Steve was inside that he thought to wonder how she would text him without his number. That’s when he noticed she had programed herself into his phone, and sent herself the picture of the squirrel. Steve smiled and changed his home screen to the picture of himself and Natasha. It was nice.

It was the continued contact with Natasha that convinced him to move to DC and eventually to work for SHEILD as an agent. He had to learn to settle the moral ambiguity of some missions, but for the most part he knew he was doing good work. He was helping people. He got his own strike team to work with. It almost felt like the war, the camaraderie and safety in being able to trust a group of people with your six. Sometimes Brock Rumlow would grab Steve for a “selfie” he called it.

“For posterity,” he said with a big smile and a clap on the back.

Steve liked him. Sometimes he disagreed with how brutal Brock could be on missions, but he knew it was a different job in a different century. Natasha fought in a similar way, finishing the job in an efficient manner, whatever the means. But despite his discrepancies, they were his team. Steve trusted them. He got along with them. He really did like them. He had felt the beginnings of something similar with the Avengers, but that was really only one fight. One big mission together and then they’d all gone their separate ways. It doesn’t really build bounds of trust.

Steve liked working for SHEILD, working for an agency Peggy had created. He called her. Finally.

“Hello?”

Steve’s heart constricted at hearing her voice. “Hi, is this—is this Peggy Carter?”

“It is,” She confirmed. “Whom, may I ask, is calling?”

“Peg it’s me,” he breathed. “It’s Steve.”

There was a heavy pause, and then a guarded, “Steve  _who_?”

A beat. “Rogers.”

“Steve,” His name sounded like a prayer. “How—can you—where are you right now?”

“I’m in DC,” he said. “SHEILD gave me your file and told me where you were. I’m working for them now. Doing some good.”

“I’m so happy for you, darling.” He imagined Peggy smiling. “Are you free to visit?”

“I will be tomorrow.”

Steve visited Peggy every day since then, brought her flowers and talked about the decades he’d missed. The first time he’d walked through her door, she clutched her hand over her mouth and had reached for him like she thought he may vanish. Peggy was hesitant but eventually she gripped his face in her hands like she’d never let go. And she smiled at him.

“You look—” she cut herself off, but Steve knew the end of that sentence.  _You look the same_. The same because it had only really been five months for him. He hadn’t quite adopted the new hair everyone around him seemed to be sporting. Peggy wrapped her arms around his back, squeezing him tightly.

“I’m so glad you’re alive.”

Steve started crying then.

When he put that plane down he never thought he’d get to have Peggy in his arms again, old as she was. He never thought he’d see her smile or hear her laugh, but he spent as many days as he could with her and got his fill of them all. Peggy even sat with him through some of the movies he’d missed, gave him her favorite songs over the decades. There was a surprising amount of a band called Queen, but Peggy assured him they were good. Her granddaughter had shown them to her.

He took plenty of pictures with Peggy now that he knew his phone had a camera in the front too. Selfies. Set a real sweet picture of just her watering her plants as his lock screen. When Peggy saw it she smiled real soft and kissed his cheek. “Still such a darling.” She’d said.

Peggy kept him healthy. If he looked like he hadn’t slept or like he hadn’t been eating as well as he should Peggy would be disappointed. So Steve started going for runs in the morning instead of at night (and accidentally running through ’til morning), and meal prepping so he wouldn’t skip because he’d had no time to make anything. Steve saw Natasha less outside of work, and he wondered if maybe she’d only been friendly to recruit him. Then he would look at the photos from the museum and feel like maybe not. He asked Peggy about it and she’d laughed.

“Friendships can start all sorts of ways, Steve.” She smiled. “Just because the beginning may not be genuine doesn’t mean it won’t ever be. Didn’t you say you and Barnes met in a brawl in the schoolyard? If a friendship can start like  _that_  and still—”

“Thank you for the advice, Peg.” Steve said. “I’ll keep it in mind.”

It wasn’t until the first anniversary of his waking up, a day Fury was kind enough to give him off, and Steve went over to Peggy’s to spend the day with her that it happened. Or maybe, that he finally  _noticed_.

They were sitting on the couch watching another movie off of his list—Mary Poppins, he remembered those books. When Peggy said she was going to get some tea to drink, asked if Steve wanted any. “No thanks, Peg.”

She nodded with a smile and went to her kitchen. Steve knew tea could sometimes take a minute, but after Peggy had been in the kitchen for nearly twenty, he went to check on her. He found her standing by the counter, staring at the cup with this absolutely baffled expression.

“Peggy?” She jumped at the sound of her name, turning to look at Steve with wild bewilderment.

“Steve, when did you get here?” She asked.

“I’ve been here for over an hour, Peg.”

“Have you?” She looked back at the cup. “Oh, yes, I must have forgotten. Do you know what I was doing in here?”

“Making tea,” Steve felt his gut twist.

“Oh tea!” Peggy exclaimed, reaching for the cupboard to pull down another cup. “That’s a wonderful idea! Do you want any, darling?”

Steve frowned and his gut twisted again. “No, I’m alright.”

They talked about it a week later. Alzheimers and dementia is what the doctors had told her. She wasn’t as lucid as she used to be, but she wasn’t quite off her rocker yet either. She refused to let Steve sit around and mope about it. “If my mind is going, I need to count on you to remember every moment of us together, Steve. From then and from now,” she commanded of him. “Someone has to.”

A few months later she was barely capable of living on her own, and her family moved her to assisted living care. It was a nice facility in downtown DC, much closer to Steve’s apartment as luck would have it. She continued to get worse, more of her memory slipping. That year was the hardest for Steve. He tried to visit her as much as he could, but SHEILD sent him on more and more missions. He wished he had someone else like Peggy that he could talk to about her, but all his friendships were…scattered. Maybe not real at all. Tony was back in New York and probably didn’t want to hear Steve call and cry about Peggy. Plus, Steve wouldn’t feel comfortable doing that. He really didn’t know all that much about him. Natasha was still a wild card. He could count on her in the field, but he felt the need to keep a barrier up about his personal life at SHEILD. Also why he never talked to Brock about it. He really wished that—

It had been nearly two years for Steve, and he could still barely think his name—like the wound he’d left was still fresh and bleeding. Like it had happened yesterday.

God, he wished Bucky were there.

The museum opened an exhibit on Captain America. Steve saw it on the handy News app Natasha had shown him how to use. “Captain America exhibit to open in National Air and Space Museum at Smithsonian Institute, January 6,” it read.

“A whole exhibit all about you, big guy.” Brock laughed after Steve mentioned the news. “With things like that someone could grow an ego.”

“An ego?” Natasha chimed from the other side of the drop ship. “On Steve ‘Back In My Day’ Rogers? Parish the thought.”

Brock laughed harder. Steve blushed.

“Maybe they’ll mention you, Romanov.” Brock cracked.

Natasha shot him an enigmatic smile. “If I know historians, the people featured in that exhibit are going to be: long dead, billionaires, historical figures, or gods.”

The Smithsonian of course contacted him and asked if he wanted to speak at the opening. Steve thought about it, he really did, but in the end he decided to give them a statement they could publish or publicize or hang in the front gallery if they wanted.

“It’s wonderful that you’re choosing celebrate not only my life, but the lives of the Howling Commandos and everyone who helped us through. You don’t often hear about the heroes of the war unless they were wearing the stars and stripes as an outfit, but I promise you they were there—in the trenches and the work camps. Thank you for choosing to include them in this exhibit.”

“Thank you, Captain Rogers.” The reporter the Smithsonian had sent smiled and turned off her recorder. “We hope you will choose to go visit the museum soon, and tell us if you like the exhibit.”

Steve agreed and lead her out, with a promise to email her with any additional thoughts.

His actual impression of the museum was…overwhelming. There was the culmination of his whole life laid out for the American public with all the dirty spots scrubbed out. He read the passage about growing up in Brooklyn and always “being a fighter,” and he wanted to scribble in that he fought in alleyways. It wasn’t anything to be proud of and they weren’t glamorous fights. He would come home with gravel in his knuckles or, once, a nail in his foot. Bucky had screamed the house down about that one. Said he was lucky if he didn’t get lockjaw. Demanded Steve wrap it in clean bandages, prop it up somewhere, and not try to walk ’til it was completely healed. Steve wondered why Bucky wasn’t mentioned in his little blurb.

Then he got to Bucky’s part. The big glass pane with his face on it along with his birthday—March 10th. Steve felt he could stare at Bucky’s face for the rest of the day. He hadn’t forgotten, no, but the years had dulled the memories just a little. He forgot just how sharp his cheekbones were, and the exact way his lips turned down. That was before he noticed the old news reel they had playing just below the picture. Steve’s breath caught in his chest. It was them, laughing about something. The way Bucky’s whole face lit up when he laughed, and looking at the ground—that was all him. Steve missed him with an actual ache in his stomach he hadn’t felt since ’45. He’d forgotten the way he smiled.

The section really only had the barest bones of information on Bucky. They mentioned Becca, Ruthie, and Evelyn but not by name; whether that was because they declined or simply to protect their information, Steve didn’t know. Steve didn’t actually know if the girls were still living. He should…he should look them up. After.

In total the exhibit was hard to walk through. There were pictures of the Commandos up everywhere, news reels playing on repeat of them strategizing or laughing. He missed them. He missed the war, as awful as it was. Steve wanted to step back into 1943, if only for a minute, to let those men know how grateful he was for them. Time wasn’t as forgiving as his wishes wanted it to be.

When Steve got home that night, he wanted to write the reporter and tell her his thoughts, but he also wanted to never talk about it again. He knew he would go back. Just to see their faces again, smiling, he would go back.

Instead of sitting in the dark of his living room wishing he were in another time, Steve pulled out his phone. Sure he could take photos on his own, but he could also pull them from the internet too. He’d seen Natasha and Brock do that plenty of times. He typed in to Google ‘ _Howling Commandos photographs_ ’. A few options came up, but the ones he loved the most he grabbed. One of them, he went to his computer to take because he just knew it had to be his background there. The other…was a still from one of the news reels. He and Bucky were looking at a map, Dugan and Gabe were in the background talking to each other. It could have been any day. That one became Steve’s home and lock screen.

It turned out, after some careful Googling, that Ruthie and Evelyn Barnes were no longer living. Ruthie having passed just a month before Steve had woken up, and Evelyn had died during some riots in the late 60’s. But Becca…Becca was married and living back in Brooklyn. The records said that she had a couple of kids, even some grandkids, and there was an interview with her and Ruthie from 1995 on YouTube. Steve clicked on it.

The intro played, and the video cut to a bright studio. A blonde woman sat smiling at the camera, “ _Good morning, everyone. Today we have with us Rebecca Proctor and Ruth Thomas, the only surviving friends of_ the _Captain America, who passed away fifty years ago today._ ” She turned to the girls—women, now—who were smiling tight, sad smiles. “ _Thank you, ladies, for being with us today._ ”

“ _Our pleasure, Christie,_ ” Becca said.

“ _Please,_ ” the woman, Christie, leaned forward in her seat. “ _Tell us about the Captain. Was he really as great as he seemed?_ ”

“ _Definitely_ ,” Becca agreed, without hesitation. “ _Stevie was like another brother to us. Sharp as a tack and unfailingly good. The best man I ever knew, and that includes my husband. Would’ve married him if he’d ever asked._ ” The women laughed.

“ _Well, tell us about him_ ,” Christie insisted. “ _Obviously, we can’t ask much about World War II, but what about before. What was it like growing up in the Depression with someone who would become a legend?_ ”

“ _Honestly_ ,” Ruthie smiled that crooked Barnes grin. “ _It was like growing up with anybody else. ‘Cept_ Steve _was always coming by with a different sort of bruise or cut. Seemed his eyes would trade which one got to be bruised that week. Drove Bucky up a wall._ ”

“ _Bucky Barnes_ ,” Christie clarified.

“ _Our big brother_ ,” Becca confirmed. “ _Him and Steve were thick as thieves. He’s the only reason we knew him_.”

“ _So, Steve and Bucky were close?_ ”

“ _Close as two people could be_.”

“ _I see_ ,” Christie nodded. “ _And the both of you—would you have considered yourselves close to him?_ ”

“ _I would,_ ” Becca smiled. “ _Nothin’ like Bucky and him, but Steve and I were still relatively close in age—five years isn’t much difference in the grand scheme of things. He used to come over and help us with homework when Bucky was working. He was fantastic with equations. Reckon I only ever passed math because of him_.”

“ _And he was the most stunning artist,_ ” Ruthie cut in. “ _I remember, it must have been my seventh or eighth birthday. Nobody had any money back then, but Stevie managed to get his hands on some real nice paper_ —”

“ _Bucky’d probably bought it for him._ ” Becca said.

“ _Probably_ ,” Ruthie agreed. “ _Anyway, he had this real nice paper and instead’a buyin’ me a fancy gift, he drew me._ ”

Christie chuckled. “ _He_ drew _you?_ ”

“ _Oh, and it was a gorgeous picture of me._ ” Ruthie smiled nostalgically. “ _I’m smiling and fresh-faced in it. He signed it, ‘for Ruthie, as long as you keep smiling the world is a brighter place, all my love, Stevie’._ ” She looked for a moment like she might cry, and continued softly, “ _I kept it, course I did. It’s hanging in my living room right now._ ”

Steve paused it. He couldn't listen to the rest of the fifteen minute segment without his heart falling out of his chest. He called Peggy’s home to see if it was a good time for him to visit. The nurse on the line said no, she’d been in and out of lucidity all day.

Steve felt like he was going to vibrate out of his skin. He had no idea where the energy was coming from, but he couldn’t sit around anymore. He would drown. So he went for a run. It was late and he had gone for a run that morning, but he just…had to.

With no specific destination in mind, Steve jogged around DC—eventually ending up in a park. He found a bench to sit on and nearly collapsed down onto it. He  _missed_  the girls. He missed the way Evelyn would color in his drawings, “you  _can’t,_  Stevie, you’re colors are wrong!” He missed Ruthie dancing with him because she didn’t mind him stepping on her feet. If it happened too much, she would stand on his shoes; she was the only one light enough to be able to. He missed how Becca would boss him and Bucky around. He and Bucky had suspected that Becca had a bit of a crush on him, and Bucky held it over her head constantly. When confronted about it she would yell and curse up a storm, which honestly only convinced Bucky of it more.

The Barnes family had done so much for him. After his ma died and before he and Buck had gotten a place, it was George who had opened up his home. With four children living there, it wasn’t exactly a spacious house. Becca, who had been sharing a room with Bucky, had to move back into the room with Ruthie and Evelyn both. She had been resentful about that for maybe a week before Steve had offered to sleep on the floor. Becca was so horrified by the idea that she collected up all her stubborn and demanded he remain in the bed. He kept insisting, which led Becca to chuck a pillow at his head one day and threaten, “If you try to sleep on the goddamned floor  _one more time_ , Steve Rogers, I will nail you to that bed myself.”

Steve felt as if he had betrayed them somehow, by not coming home. By not bringing  _Bucky_  home. They had given him everything they could, and he couldn’t even keep one person safe. It was his fault, his fault,  _his fault_  that Bucky fell. His idea to zip-line onto that train. He’s the reason Bucky had stayed after Azzano. The Army was going to let him go. Maybe Steve would have still gone down with the plane, maybe he wouldn’t have. The point is Bucky would be safe.

He was crying.

It was a startling realization. That he had been sitting on this bench, in a public park—in  _February—_ crying. Another belated realization was that he hadn’t bothered with too many layers either. He generally ran hotter than most people, but still the winter chill was starting to seep into his bones a little in just sweatpants and a long sleeve top. Steve pulled out his phone, didn’t look at his lock or home screens too long, and opened Maps. It was two in the morning and he was thirty minutes from his house. Great.

On the two year anniversary of his waking up, Steve got a FaceTime call at five am exactly from Tony Stark.

“Tony, it’s five,” Steve complained, having just flicked his lamp on and rolled over to answer.

“I know,” Tony sad. “I was working on my suit all night, and I realized it was morning. And  _then_  I realized it was your awakening day.”

“Don’t say it like that,” he sighed. “Sounds like a horror movie.”

“Could be,” Tony nodded. “Zombie Cap. You seen any of the horror movies I sent you? I tried to keep them as non-war, non-frozen alive as possible. Didn’t know if  _The Shinning_  would count; so I mentioned it, but didn’t actually send it. Did you watch them?”

“I watched  _The Birds_.”  _With Peggy_ , but he didn’t say that.

“Great choice,” he said. “You should watch  _Carrie_  next.”

They chattered on like that for a while, before Tony actually looked at his phone for more than a second. “Wait, wait, wait, hold on, Capsicle.”

“What?”

“Your hair.”

“ _What_?” Steve patted his head self-consciously. “I probably have bed head.”

“No, yeah, you  _do_ , but—”

“But?”

Tony frowned. “Your hair is still World War Army regulation.”

“What’s wrong with that?” Steve said, defensively.

“Well, Uncle Sam, it’s 2014,” Tony fixed him with a look. “You’ve been here for two years. No one wears their hair like that.”

“I know…” Steve had noticed, but it felt familiar. Nothing else did anymore.

“How do you expect to adjust to the new age, if you can’t even adjust something that grows back if you don’t like it?”

“I…never thought about it like that.”

“I’m sending Natasha hairdressers.” Tony declared. “Because I know she’ll actually make the appointment and make you go.”

“Tony, you don’t have to—”

“Too late, Fourth of July,” he grinned. “Happy Awakening Day.”

He hung up. It was only a minute later that Natasha texted him an address, date, and time. ‘To cure your grandpa hair’ read the following text.

The haircut itself wasn’t all that bad. Steve saved time trying to style it every morning; instead putting a little gel in the top, like the stylist showed him, and he was ready to go. Natasha gave him a thumbs up the first day he came into work with it, and Brock wolf whistled. He got exactly ten compliments on his way through the building. Maybe it  _was_  a good change.

He was stopped just outside the elevator with Natasha, when one of the analysts who worked with them relatively often came to stand next to him. Steve shot her a courtesy smile, and she blushed bright red. “Good morning, Captain.” She chirped.

“Morning, Miss White,” he replied.

She waved her hand dismissively. “You can—just Caitlyn is fine.”

The elevator opened. “What floor?”

“What?” Caitlyn blinked. “Oh, uh, no, I’m going down not up. Sorry.”

“Oh, then, see you around.” Steve smiled again.

“See you,” She echoed. “And, um, I really like your haircut.”

Natasha smirked as the elevator doors closed. Steve gave her credit that it took her at least three floors before she spoke.

“You should ask her out.”

“Natasha.”

“She’s clearly into you,” she pointed out. “And she’s cute. There’s no harm in it. Get her number and ask her out.”

“She probably has a partner,” Steve protested.

“She does not,” Natasha promptly replied. “I know for a fact her last boyfriend was a year ago, and he wasn’t much to talk about.”

“How?” She raised an eyebrow at him. “Okay fine, I’ll ask her.”

The date didn’t go well. It wasn’t awful, really, no one cried or threw up. They went to a nice restaurant and took a walk around the Washington Mall. They tried talking about movies until Caitlyn had realized he still hadn’t seen very many. Then they switched to books, but Steve realized most of the books he’d read are ones she would consider “classics.” And she hadn’t read very many herself. They talked baseball a little. It was probably their best subject of the night.

At the end he walked her home, right up to her door. She’d kissed him, real sweet. When she pulled away he could see in her face that this was not something they would probably repeat. “I’ll see you at work?” He offered. She smiled brightly, nodded, and went inside. He hoped she found someone good. Caitlyn really was a lovely woman.

It seemed, though, that as soon as Steve had given Natasha an inch into his private life, she was determined to take a mile. Suddenly he was being bombarded with texts about “coming out with some of the team” or “I think Nancy in foreign affairs is sweet on you.” That one was a bit of a running joke of Natasha’s. Nancy was probably about 84 years old, and had been harboring that crush since the first Captain America news real came out in the forties.

The invitations out on the town, however…those were alright. The “team” was usually Brock, Jack Rollins, Maria Hill, Natasha, and some R&D techies. Every so often Clint would make an appearance as well. They usually all went out to the same bar, somewhere the lights were never very high and there was a dance floor. As much as Steve did like Brock, he usually ended up hanging by the bar with Rollins and sometimes Grant Ward, when he would show. Steve didn’t know them as well, so he would stick by Natasha and Maria, which meant inevitably being dragged onto the dance floor. He didn’t know what to do with…his hands.

Natasha insisted he didn’t actually have to do anything except move with the music. But then sometimes she or Maria, or god forbid one of the techies he didn’t know very well, would dance very,  _very_  close to him. Those were the moments that threw Steve. However, it only took it happening a couple times in a row for Steve to realize the girls were using him as a bit of a security blanket from the other men there. That didn’t mean he suddenly knew what to do with his hands.

One night when the group was a little smaller, Natasha disappeared into the crowd and Steve found himself alone in the crush of bodies. He…didn’t like that as much. He made his way out toward the high tables where he could barely see the top of Brock’s head, and was so focused on getting there he ran right into a guy. The man pulled back, looking miffed until he took Steve in. His eyes drifted all the way down and all the way back up Steve’s body, before catching his eyes. The man smiled in a slow, lazy way that managed to tug on both Steve’s gut and his heart.

“Hello,” he said in a way that managed to suggest a whole lot of things.

“I didn’t mean to run into you,” Steve said. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it,” the guy shook his head. “If it’s you, I’d be alright with it happening again.”

Steve felt his cheeks warming. He licked his lips. “Is that so?” The man nodded, grinning again. Steve could feel his pulse. He knew the world had changed a lot since he went under, but this was so  _brazen_ —his work phone was going off.

“Sorry,” he excused himself, taking his phone out and stepping away. He pushed through the crowds to outside the bar, where Brock and Natasha were both standing. Each of them looked a little upset at being called in so late, but they couldn’t exactly say no either.

The Jeep that picked them up was driving directly to the airport; so Steve figured they’d be able to change into tac-gear on the plane. Natasha was sitting next to Steve in the backseat, sending off rapid fire texts on her phone. Her eye makeup was a little smudged and that was the only indication he could see of the night. She sighed heavily before stuffing her phone in her back pocket.

The plane waiting for them was small and black, the SHEILD emblem on the side. So this wasn’t a stealth mission then. The three of them got on the jet, sitting down and waiting for the flight. They each had black duffle bags with clothes, and equipment inside. Steve’s shield was hanging on the back of one of the plane seats. The flight was a couple hours, and gave ample time for each of them to change and get ready. When Brock was in the bathroom, Natasha came to stand by Steve as he clipped on his utility belt. She looked at him.

“Alright?” Steve asked.

“Dandy,” she shot back. There was a moment; then she gave him a small smile. Ah, she was teasing him then. “Back at the bar…you make a friend?”

Steve’s back stiffened. He tried his best to be as nonchalant as possible when he replied, “Who?”

“The guy you were talking to,” Natasha continued. “Well you weren’t really  _talking_  much.”

“We weren’t doing anything.” Steve snapped. Natasha blinked, but thankfully let the topic drop. Steve did catch her shooting him looks here and there for the rest of the mission.

Steve really did like his morning runs. The sun was coming up earlier and earlier, meaning he was running in the half-dark less. It was easier to get up in the morning too; he could trick his brain into believing it was later in the day. He loved his route: a couple of laps around the Washington Mall and a stop at the Starbucks just a block from the Smithsonian.

That’s how he met Sam.

He wished he’d met Sam earlier, even if it had only being a day or two. Sam was cool, and a great guy to have at your six.

Steve  _really_  wished he could have found that out by spending time hanging out and talking, rather than a trial by gun fire.

That his best friend was shooting at him.

His best friend who wasn’t dead.

He wasn’t dead at all.

Apparently “waking up in the hospital feeling like a sack of bruised peaches” was something that must be written into Steve’s DNA because there he was in a hospital bed. Again. Instead of Sam sitting at his bedside like when he had first woken up, this time it was Nat. She had a book with her, something thick and not in English.

“It’s Tuesday,” she said. “You’ve been asleep for about 48 hours.”

“Thanks,” he replied. She nodded and they sat in silence for another minute.

“I’m going to get his files.” Nat broke the silence nearly an hour later. Steve had honestly been drifting, trying his best to process what had happened.

“You don’t have to.”

She smirked. “It’s for me as much as it’s for you, Steve.”

“Good luck, then.”

Steve was discharged around 6 pm that evening, and Sam was waiting to take him to his apartment. Insisting that it wasn’t an imposition, and he had the spare bedroom so why not. Steve had never felt more lucky.

Sam was a godsend. He simultaneously kept Steve on his toes, but also grounded him immensely. The following month when they prepared to leave for Europe, Sam did his best to keep Steve from wallowing around the house. They went to art museums and the zoo, tried at least one new restaurant a week. He took selfies and sent them to Steve, and eventually got Steve to start taking pictures on his phone again. Steve set his favorite one—one he had taken while running of Sam leaning over, out of breath while Steve smiled in the foreground—as his new phone lock screen. Sam also convinced him to start using Instagram.

“You are not telling me you don’t have one?” Sam had gawked one afternoon. “You’re an  _artist_.”

“Was an artist.” Steve corrected, waving Sam off.

“No ‘was’ about it when you got shit like this on your phone.” Sam scoffed and pointed to the picture that had started it all. It was of the New York skyline back lit with fireworks on the Fourth of July. He had taken it from Stark Tower on his first birthday out of the ice. Tony had thrown a small party (small for him) in honor of the holiday, before being told by Pepper that it was  _also_  Steve’s birthday. He then went out of his way to buy a cake and invite the Avengers. Only Nat and Clint had been free to attend; he spent most of the night with the three of them on Tony’s balcony.

“Not to mention,” Sam continued, drawing Steve back to the present. “You doodle on almost every scrap of paper in the house. You’re an artist, present tense, and you should get an Instagram.  _And_  you’re a national icon. Don’t deprive the world of their only view of the gun show.”

Steve laughed but agreed. The app wasn’t really that hard to use, and soon he was posting some of those pictures he’d taken in his earlier days: the New York skyline, his coffee steaming in the winter, Tony working in the lab, and—with a smile—the squirrel. Within days he had a follower count of…higher than just Sam and Nat. A week later, Nat texted him a  _Buzzfeed_  article titled “Captain America: Brooklyn Hipster at Heart?” They linked all of his posts and suddenly he had thousands of followers and climbing. Which was…a new feeling.

His use of Instagram meant that he was suddenly taking pictures thinking about how they would fit into that format. He posted a few pictures of sketches he’d done, and even a couple of paintings. The comments were mostly positive, which was nice. Steve thought maybe someday he could make money off of just art—someday way in the future when Bucky wasn’t off on his own.

Steve drew Bucky more. When he first came out of the ice it had been too fresh to want to. He hadn’t wanted to think about Bucky, or his life, in any sort of past tense. And then, the less he did the more he was afraid to, like putting his face down on paper meant that it had all really happened. He was also terrified that he would have sat down to draw Bucky only to realize he’d completely forgotten what his best friend looked like. An irrational fear, he now knew, he would never forget Bucky’s face. He couldn’t.

So Steve found himself sitting on Sam’s couch drawing what he remembered Bucky looking like in the thirties, and what he had looked like on the street in DC…at the Triskelion—scared, hurt, and confused. Steve never posted these; though a few of the ones before the war made their way on. The first comment that read ‘is that Bucky Barnes?’ cut through his heart so sharply, he thought he must actually be bleeding. The only answer to that he felt appropriate was changing the caption of the photo from nothing to ‘how I remember him,’ and letting the fans come to their own conclusions.

Sam liked to bug Steve about his lack of selfies, though.

“You have to,” he said. “For the good of the American people, Steven, post a photo of you and that jawline.”

“Sam, c’mon.”

“The American people,” Sam emphasized by jabbing Steve’s arm with his finger. “You’re also depriving them of my beautiful face. How many selfies have we got together that you could post? Dozens.”

“Would people like that?” Steve asked. “I’ve been mostly posting art. I don’t think anyone had followed me for my face.”

Sam raised an eyebrow. “They followed you because you’re you. No one’s going to be upset.”

So Steve posted one. Sam was right…no one was upset.

They left for Europe a day later. Steve spent the whole trip wishing beyond belief that they would find Bucky and he would come home with them. But they always seemed just a day too late, catching the ruins of Hydra layers and sometimes actual Hydra agents. They were in Europe for months before the trail seemed to run cold just outside of Bucharest, Romania.

Steve could cry. He just wanted his best friend back. He didn’t care what condition or capacity he just  _wanted_  him. He wanted to be able to get up in the morning and see Bucky eating or reading the paper. Maybe in this new century he’d be cleaning a gun—something Nat had done in the mornings before. Steve didn’t care. He  _didn’t_. But it felt so hopeless when every turn there was another confusing set of clues on where he could have gone next. Maybe he didn’t want to be caught. Maybe he didn’t really remember Steve at all. Maybe he was chasing a ghost and he should just give up.

“Where to next, Cap?” Sam sat on the bed across from Steve, pulling his socks on.

“Trail’s gone,” he shrugged.

“We could go backwards?” Sam suggested. “This lead could’ve been fake. We can see if anything else crops up.”

“Or we could go home,” Steve sighed. “And I could admit to myself that I’m never getting him back.”

“Whoa, hey, hang on,” he shook his head. “We didn’t come out here for two months to give up. We came here to get your boy back, and that’s what we’re going to do. Whether it takes two months or two years, I’ve got your six, Cap.”

“Thanks, Sam.” Steve tried a smile. “I need…a distraction, I think.”

Sam was quiet for a second, then clapped. “Let’s go sight seeing. We’ve been in Europe for six months and we haven’t seen any sights.”

“Right now?”

“Yeah, suit up, Cap,” Sam grinned. “We got a city to see.”

The city was gorgeous. Steve was a little mad at himself for ignoring everywhere they’d been. Of course he’d been to Europe before, but it was a little different from 1944 bombed out cities. Mostly, the guilt was to depriving Sam of seeing these places.

They took plenty of pictures—Sam sending half of them to Nat. The buildings were gorgeous and an interesting combination of history. He found himself taking pictures of the towering Athenaeum and quieter buildings in Old Town, where they ate lunch. By the time they got back to the safe house (one of the ones Fury had kept private from SHIELD and hopefully wasn’t compromised), Steve felt better, more settled. He posted his favorite picture of the day up on to his Instagram, thinking if he remembered any part of the trip, if they didn’t end up finding Bucky, then he’d want to remember today.

The next morning, he and Sam were on a secure line with Nat, going over and re-going over intel trying to figure out where they could have misjudged a move. 

“I don’t think he would go back to Russia,” Nat was saying.

“It’s an  _option_ ,” Sam argued. “We have to consider—”

He was still talking, but Steve stopped listening. It felt like the air was different…heavier. He sat up a little straighter and  _listened_. It didn’t sound like there was someone in the house. The place was small enough that you could yawn in the front room and hear it in the bedroom. Sam and he had been trading off who slept on the couch and who slept on the bed, but the place was mostly bare bones. They were both in the bedroom now; if there was someone in the house, they’d be visible through the open door soon enough.

Steve stood and grabbed his shield from where it was, motioning for Sam to continue talking when he looked up questioningly. He nodded, grabbing his gun and covering Steve while trying his best to keep up the conversation. Nat must have picked up that something was up on their end because she suddenly took control of the topic, chatting endlessly about locations and trails. Trails they had already followed, but the person in the front room might not know that.

Steve moved first, stepping through the doorway, down the tiny hallway, into the living room, and—

Nothing.

No one is there.

He could have yelled. He could have yelled and shouted and cried to heaven, but he didn’t. Because no one is there. He and Sam physically relax, but Steve’s insides were still strung out because he was so sure. He was so  _sure_. But there is something out of place. On the kitchen counter, next to the shitty coffee maker, is a scrap of paper he’s positive wasn’t there that morning. Steve dropped the shield and picked it up.

_Calea Victorei. Noon._

The handwriting was a kick to the stomach.

“What is it?” Sam asked over his shoulder.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“Send me a picture,” came Nat’s voice, over Sam’s phone. Steve hadn't realized that Sam had grabbed it. “Calea Victorei is the biggest street in Bucharest.”

“He wants…to meet on some random street.” Sam said, sarcasm dragging his words. “Seriously?”

“Sam we—I can’t just…”

“I know, Steve,” he sighed. “But a whole street is a lot of ground to cover.”

Nat hacked in to security cameras, that’s how they covered the whole street. He and Sam were at a cafe, sipping tea until noon. Steve was trying so hard to not vibrate out of his chair, but he couldn’t help his leg from bouncing up and down. It was Bucky, after all.

At noon they stood up and walked the street, acting the part as tourists. Nat would call if she caught sight of him, Steve had to keep reminding himself. Bucky was going to meet them, he wasn’t going to run away. Why would he go to the trouble of breaking in and leaving the message if he was going to leave?

_Maybe he doesn’t want to come home, and wants to live his life free of you._

No, no. He shook the thought from his head.

At exactly 12:15, Sam’s phone rang.

“ _You’ve got a tail_ ,” Steve overheard.

“The kind we’re hoping for?” Sam asked, shooting Steve a glance.

“You’ll have to find that out for yourselves,” she answered. “Good luck.” And hung up.

Sam shot Steve another look and they continued walking, maybe at a little bit of a slower pace. Soon enough their tail was right behind them, hands grabbing onto their shoulders and leading them off into an alley. They went between two buildings until they were stopped in back of an older looking apartment building, near the fire escape. The whole way Steve hadn’t turned around to look at him, couldn’t bring himself too. Now, he turned around to find Bucky standing a few feet back from them, hands shoved in his pockets. He had a baseball cap low on his brow, and his clothes looked like they hadn’t been washed in weeks.

“Do you know me?” Steve wanted to hit himself. He shouldn’t have asked that question to start. ‘How are you, Bucky’ or ‘good to see you, pal’ would have worked just fine.

“You’re Steve,” was the response. Steve’s heart was in his throat, he wanted—he couldn’t.

“Buck,” Steve took a breath. “Come home, please.”

“Steve—”

“Wait, please,” he begged. “Sam said you could live with us in DC, if you wanted. Or New York, I could get a place in Manhattan or Brooklyn. Sam can live with us…or not, it’s up to you. The army backpay is great after seventy years—”

“Okay.”

Steve stopped. “Okay?” Bucky nodded, and Steve looked over at Sam, who looked worried but happy still. “Okay.” Steve agreed.

They were back home in two days.

Steve thought he had had a rough time adapting to the new century, but Bucky seemed to take one step forward to take three back. He was fantastic with technology; Sam said that makes sense if he was brought out of ice every few years, that he’d know how to work a computer. But that was it—he would sometimes stay in his room for days on end, Steve wasn’t even sure if he came out to eat or not. He only really talked to Steve and even that was done in as few words as he could.

The first time he smiled, Sam was reaching up for something on the top shelf in the kitchen and Steve beat him to it. “There you go,” Steve grinned.

“I could reach it just fine,” Sam said.

“Hey whatever you say,” Steve put his hands up. “I just remember what it was like being short.”

“I’m not short.”

“Figured I’d give you a hand up, so you didn’t pull somethin’.”

“You’re two inches taller than me.”

“It’s a tall man’s world, Sam.”

“You’re such an asshole,” Sam scoffed. “They try to teach you how good and pure Captain America is in school, but no. He’s a genuine american pain in my ass.”

Steve turned around, chuckling, and stopped at the sight of Bucky sitting at the kitchen island, small grin on his face. “Should’a seen him in grade school.”

“Oh, was it worse?” Sam asked, recovering quicker than Steve did.

“Much,” he looked at Steve and his smile spread a little wider.

Bucky had volunteered to just stay on the couch when they had first got back, and Steve outright refused. Stating that if they had shared a bed in the thirties they could damn well do it now, and it wasn’t that Steve regretted it. It was just…harder than he would have thought to keep his emotions buried when Bucky was a foot away.

At night, Steve would lay next to him, not touching, and watch the light play on the bones of his face. Bucky looked so much the same when he slept— _actually_  slept, not nightmares—the years dropping off his face. It could have been 1938, it could have been 2015. He felt at home with Bucky across from him like this. It seemed to help him too; when he would wake up at night and be able to reach for Steve. It was so commonplace for Steve to wake up in the middle of the night with Bucky’s flesh hand wrapped tight around his wrist, Steve had begun to recite the year, their location, and that everything was okay without even thinking about it.

Bucky generally got out of bed earlier than Steve or Sam did. He cased through the house, checking perimeters and locks on doors. Steve was a little ashamed he had never thought to do so, but any time Sam caught him with that forlorn look about it, he’d get set straight. Sam adjusted quickly to Bucky living there as well, but he should have expected that.

It took a few months, but soon enough Bucky was making physical contact with Steve and Sam regularly. He would clap Steve on the shoulder in the mornings before sitting down to breakfast, or shove at Sam’s legs to make room on the couch. The couch that was frankly too small to fit three former soldiers.

“Okay this is ridiculous,” Sam exclaimed one evening. “I’m either buying a bigger couch, or we’re getting another armchair. What do  _you_  want?”

Bucky looked at Steve and shrugged. “An arm chair would be cheaper,” Steve answered.

“Ridiculous,” Sam repeated, rolling his eyes.

The following Saturday, they had a new arm chair.

Steve really liked to draw Bucky, now that he felt like less of a flight risk. Now that he wouldn’t sequester himself away into his bedroom and spent a lot of time in the living room, even on a couple of occasions going out to the store with them. Steve loved sitting in the armchair and drawing Bucky reading or watching a tv show or reading up on space travel in the last few decades. Boy was Bucky excited by space travel. He would come up to Steve at least once a day with a new fact.

“Stevie, did you know we sent a  _monkey_  to space!” Bucky said, looking up from Sam’s iPad in awe.

“Yeah,” Steve nodded. “You know we sent people up too?”

Bucky scoffed, “‘Course I do; wasn’t on ice for all seventy years—unlike  _some_  people.”

“Wow,” Steve laughed. “You callin’ me lazy?”

“Takin’ a nap like that?” A slow smirk spread across Bucky’s face, “Ain’t callin’ you a hard worker, that’s for damn sure.”

The conversations often happened like that. Teasing and jibbing until Sam would interrupt or Bucky would get drawn back into what he was doing. Steve had an album’s worth of pictures of Bucky and nearly a whole sketchbook’s worth, too. Sam making just as frequent an appearance. He found he couldn’t stop taking picture after picture, saving them since he couldn’t post. Bucky hadn’t been cleared of his crimes yet—the court proceedings and trials were set for a year from then. But, god, Steve hoarded images of his best friend. A particularly nice image of Bucky and Sam lost in their own worlds, but sitting on the same couch, became is home screen.

One day when Steve was drawing Sam from memory—cooking and singing as he occasionally did—Bucky leaned over the back of the couch. “You drawin’, Steve?”

Steve smiled without looking up. “If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck…”

Bucky snorted, resting his head on top of Steve’s and looking down at his sketchbook. “You got drawings of me in there?”

“A few,” he felt his face warming.

“Can I see ‘em?” By way of answering, Steve held the book up to Bucky who took it, climbing over the back of the couch to sit down. He flipped to the first page where images of…before were drawn. Bucky didn't spend much time on those, flipping through until he reached the first Steve had done of him in this new century. In that one, Bucky was sitting curled up by himself, engrossed in his own thoughts. Steve was quite proud of the shadow in that one. Bucky flipped through further, coming to an image of him laughing, face lit up and eyes dancing. He traced his fingers along the edge of that one.

“Remember—” he stopped. “Remember I used to love watching you draw—loved your art. You drew real nice pictures of the city. My—my favorite ones,” he hesitated, swallowing hard. “Favorite ones you ever did were of me.”

Bucky’s eyes left the paper and found Steve’s. “Loved you drawin’ me. Love having all of your attention.”

“Loved doin’ it,” Steve had to swallow some emotion back down his throat or he’d choke. “I love lookin’ at you—smiling, frowning, sleeping.” Bucky was leaning closer. His whole right side was already pressed shoulder-to-ankle against Steve. He wondered how it would feel to press even closer together. Bucky’s eyes were intense. “You’re so beautiful all the time, I—”

He stopped. God, he stopped. He couldn’t say it, couldn’t get his mouth to make the words.

He seemed to know. Steve hoped he knew. By the way Bucky’s eyes widened fractionally and his whole body froze. Oh god, oh  _fuck_.

“Could you…” Bucky said. “Stevie, could you draw a picture of space for me?”

“What kind of picture?” He asked, still caught in the trance of Bucky’s eyes.

“The moon and some stars,” he shrugged. “Nothing hard.”

“‘Course, Buck,” Steve said. “Anything you want.”

Bucky licked his lips. “I want… I want it blue. And dark. Want it to look like home, like the Brooklyn sky from the rooftop of your ma’s place.”

“You remember—”

“Yeah.”

Steve swallowed hard. “Sure thing, Buck.”

Steve drew the picture; it only took him three days to finish it, get the shading right. He spent an hour contemplating whether or not to ink it in before Sam subtly-not-so-subtly told him to get on with it. When he gave it to Bucky, he felt his heart seize up in his chest. He asked if he liked it, and Bucky just remained silent, staring at the at the image.

He was shaking.

God, he was shaking. Steve couldn’t remember the last time he saw Bucky shake. Probably before the war, before sniper training took that from him. Before the Soldier…Before.

Bucky finally looked up, taking a deep breath through a tense jaw. He leaned forward planting the softest, barely there kiss against the corner of Steve’s mouth. “Thank you.”

From then on Bucky was much more…free with his affection. He’d already gotten more comfortable touching people (by ‘people’ Steve meant himself and Sam and  _maybe_  Natasha), but this was new. Bucky would curl his fingers around Steve’s wrist when watching movies both alone and when some Avengers joined them. He often would stand behind Steve’s chair at the table, talking to Sam, and run his fingers through the baby hairs at the nape of Steve’s neck. He would curl up against Steve, nearly on top of him, in bed every night. And one time, that nearly shook Steve to the bone, Bucky pulled Steve into the kitchen by his belt loop. It was early in the morning, he was clearly still exhausted from not great sleep the night before, and Bucky—without hesitation!—grabbed Steve’s belt loops and pulled him to the coffeemaker.

Not that Steve minded any of this. He didn’t. He didn’t mind at all, even a little bit. In fact, he was encouraged to give Bucky all of the little touches he’d been too afraid to. Too afraid that Bucky wouldn’t want that familiarity again, or that he would think it meant something. Well, okay, it  _meant_  something, but Steve wasn’t going to force it to mean something to Bucky. Every time he could rest his palm against Bucky’s cheek for a moment or wrap an arm around him for an episode of tv, Steve felt at home in the new century.

“You didn’t tell me.” Nat said one night, after finishing Jurassic Park. Steve and she had made their way into the kitchen, taking on dish duty together.

Steve frowned, confused. “Tell you what?”

“You and James,” she continued.

“Nat,” he began with a cheeky grin. “I told you about Bucky. I clearly remember saying that I knew him and—”

“Steve,” Nat cut him off. “You trust me.”

It wasn’t a question. “Of course I do. You know that.”

Natasha was quiet for a moment, staring at nothing and mechanically drying a plate. “Okay,” she seemed to come to a conclusion. “I’m glad you two are happy.”

“Thank you,” he smiled. “I don’t want to speak for Bucky, though. He might—”

“Steve,” she stopped him again. “If he’s not happy, I’m no good at reading people.”

Steve paused, smiled again. “Thanks, Nat.”

They went back to the living room where Sam, Bucky, and Clint were all eying each other over the last slice of pizza. Nat walked past, snatching it from the box, and sitting down in the arm chair. “Are we watching another movie?”

Clint closed his mouth, which had dropped open a moment before. “What movies haven’t the senior citizens seen yet?”

“I don’t know,” Steve hummed, reaching for his notepad when he felt it being pulled from his back pocket. Bucky held the list, thumbing through the pages of recommendations.

“We haven’t seen The Notebook, yet, or Indiana Jones.” Bucky said, absently reading the most recent page.

“Indiana Jones,” Sam piped, nodding his head. “No question.”

“Do you have them?” Clint asked. Sam scoffed. While they set up the next movie, Bucky slipped Steve’s notebook back into his pocket and pulled him down to the couch. Steve went willingly, leaning up against Bucky’s right side as they settled in.

Steve saw his text the next morning, from Nat, of he and Bucky cuddled up together. It must have been somewhere toward the end of the movie, because both of them were asleep slumped together toward Steve’s end of the couch. Bucky’s head resting on Steve’s chest…So similar to the way they used to fall asleep when Steve was sick, it was a physical pain in his chest. The photo immediately became his home screen.

Not even three months later, there are robots flying through the skies and trying to wreck Eastern European cities. And Tony—god, Tony and his  _arrogance_  and—

They moved out of Sam’s apartment and into the Compound.

He really didn’t know what to do with Wanda. Well, he knew what to do with her: give her a room, a home, but he didn’t know what to make of her. She was young, so young and powerful. She took to Steve quickly, thank god, and to Bucky even quicker. There were many nights when he walked in on Bucky and Wanda sitting in the common space, cups of something warm in hand, speaking quietly in Russian to one another. They never stopped speaking when Steve entered, but they did take stock of him. He felt like he was intruding anyway, and quietly left most times.

One night Steve walked in, with all intentions of getting a few protein bars for his room, and the pattern changed.

“Stevie,” Bucky called from the circle of couches. He looked over, and like always Wanda and Bucky were sitting beside each other. This time, though, they were both looking at him too, and Bucky was waving him over. When Steve got there, Bucky tugged him down between him and Wanda. His hand rested lightly on Steve’s thigh. “Go ‘head,” Bucky said softly.

Wanda looked at Bucky, then at Steve, and then she took a deep breath…and talked. Stories of years and years came flooding out of her mouth, about Pietro and her home. About her time with HYDRA, about what they did. She talked and talked, and cried and crushed her jaw the same way Steve  _knows_  he does too. Her whole life poured out of her mouth as if she’d been waiting for the right people to tell it to…for someone else who could carry it with her. Eventually, inevitably, she ran out of words and just sat, breathing with the two of them.

“I didn’t mean…for all of that—”

“Don’t apologize,” Bucky said softly, still.

“I-I want to trust you all,” she continued. “I want to be an Avenger.”

“Okay,” Steve said. “Okay.”

Wanda fit herself into Steve and Bucky’s life pretty easily. She ate breakfast with them, and then headed to training with Sam. Nat liked to take them in the mornings. Bucky was offered to join too, but he had declined. “There are good therapists here,” he had said. “I think I’m gonna talk to one or two.” And he did. Every other day at two o’clock, Bucky disappeared for an hour and a half before coming back—looking a little worse for wear at first, but increasingly better every day. Steve was so, so proud.

Steve hadn’t talked to Tony for longer than necessary in almost a month. It’s…not the greatest, but he feels… He thought he and Tony were close, or could have been. But lying, the robots, Ultron, all of it— _all of it_. Steve didn’t know how to handle how he felt. If he even knows how he felt.

He stewed about it. A lot.

“Steve?” Came the tentative voice of Wanda. She’s wrapped in a blanket. It was late…very late; Steve could see the black sky out the window. “Are you alright?”

“Of course,” he agreed instantly. It’s almost a conditioned response. How long had he been sitting out here? He couldn’t feel his ass. Probably too long. He didn’t remember how he got there—wait. Yes he did. He had finished a late dinner with Bucky and Sam, and headed over to sit down. Bucky had asked him how long he was going to be; Steve said a few minutes. It was more than a few minutes.

“Steve,” she said again.

“Yeah, sorry,” he tried for a smile.

“You should get rest,” she said firmly.

“I will,” he thought he managed to get near to a smile, glancing out toward the windows. He couldn’t see the rolling hills of upstate New York that he knew were out there. He’d never found time to walk through the woods, though he meant to.

“Steve,” his name interrupted his thoughts again, only this time it wasn’t Wanda.

“Buck?”

“How long have you been sitting out here?” Bucky looked concerned and sleep ruffled. Wanda was standing just behind him. Steve looked back to Bucky and found familiar concern living in those steel blue eyes. He didn’t know. He didn’t know how long he’d been there. He shrugged. Bucky’s face melted a little, sadness breaking through the worry.

He cupped the side of Steve’s face. “Come to bed?”

“Yeah…yeah, Buck, okay.” Steve stood, allowing Bucky take his hand and grasp it tightly.

“ _Spasibo_ , Wanda.” Bucky smiled at her and she nodded.

Bucky led him to their bedroom—they hadn’t bothered to stop sharing a room after moving into the compound, it seemed…pointless—and sat him on the bed. He carefully stroked Steve’s cheek, brushing a quick kiss to his forehead before immediately helping Steve pull off his clothes. Bucky made quick work, and all Steve could do was sit there and watch.

He was so…tired.

“Lazy,” Bucky hummed.

“What?”

“I told you before,” he shot Steve a wily grin. “You’ve gotten lazy in your old age. Having me take your clothes off’a you like you’ve suddenly forgotten how or something.”

God… _god_ , he was trying to make Steve laugh. A surge of affection welled up from the pit of Steve’s stomach and he grabbed Bucky’s wrists, stopping him where he was unbuttoning Steve’s jeans. He looked up at Steve, a tenderness in his gaze, in his hands. Steve’s hand was running through his best friend’s hair; he didn’t exactly remember telling his hand to do that but…it was nice. Bucky leaned into it, smile going soft.

“I love you,” Steve said. “You know that, don’t you?”

Bucky’s smile changed again, lighting up his whole face. “I had an inkling. You’ve never been subtle.”

“Great,” he laughed, blushing. “I’m glad I’ve been telegraphing to you for years, and you didn’t do anything about it.”

“ _I_  am patient,” Bucky poked Steve in the side. “I can actually  _wait_  for a moment.”

“Have there not been moments?” Steve asked, laughter still in his voice.

“Oh sure,” Bucky nodded. “Plenty’a moments. But Steve here’s the thing—” he leaned in, “your breath reeks.”

Steve broke out in laughter.

“Like a garbage can, pal.” Bucky continued. “You think you love a guy, and then he breathes on you before seven a.m.? Wasted. Years of care and affection down the drain.”

“You think your breath is pleasant right away?” Steve giggled.

“Yes, Steven, I’m a blessing to God’s green earth.”

“More like a menace.”

“Rude,” Bucky smiled. “Now I’m sure I don’t love you.”

“Well, thank god,” Steve pretended to wipe sweat off his forehead. “Because I was lying before.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,”

“Had me fooled,” and Bucky pressed his lips to Steve’s. He could taste the smile on them, taste the joy. Even though that didn’t make any sense in his head when he thought about it; that’s the only way he could think to describe it. 

Bucky’s lips were rough and chapped like Steve knew they’d be—he bit them often enough. But his mouth…god. And the way his hair felt through Steve’s fingers. And the way Bucky’s hand was holding his neck, the other balancing him on Steve’s thigh. Steve yanked Bucky from leaning over him, onto the bed, and laying along side him. Bucky gasped as he went, and Steve took the opportunity to bring tongues into the game. Bucky let out a soft moan, wrapping his metal arm around Steve’s hips and yanking them closer. The kiss slowed and then stopped. Steve kissed him once, twice, three times more.

Bucky sighed, “I love you, too. So we’re clear.”

“Morning breath notwithstanding?” Steve teased.

“Don’t stop brushing your teeth on my account, Stevie.”

“Aw, shucks, alright since you asked.”

Bucky laughed softly, running his knuckles against Steve’s cheekbone. “Wanna tell me why you were out sitting for so long?”

Steve didn’t. “I, uh—I just…Ultron, um—”

“Are you still mad about it?”

“No,”

“Mad at Tony?”

“No, maybe—” Steve huffed. “I don’t think I am.”

Bucky frowned, staring into Steve’s eyes. “You don’t talk to him anymore.”

“Not really,” Steve knew he should.

“You blame him.”

“Yes. Maybe. I don’t know.”

“You want him to hurt about it, too?”

“No!”

“You want him to realize  _you’re_  hurt?”

“I’m not—”

“That the team’s hurt?”

“No!” Steve snapped, taking harsh breaths. “I feel betrayed! He didn’t tell any of us that he was—and now so many people are dead! He broke our trust— _my_  trust. He was my first friend when I woke up, and he—he—”

“Breathe,” Bucky commanded, and Steve took a ragged inhale. “Explain this to him.”

“I don’t know how.” Steve cried, quietly. “And I’m sure he knows, or feels like garbage.”

“Yeah,” he conceded. “But he’s important to you, right?”

“Yeah,”

“Then stop ignoring him and talk.” Bucky rolled his eyes. “God, just because we’re from the forties doesn’t mean we have to be emotionally repressed like the forties.”

Steve laughed, a little wetly. “You’re right.”

“I know I am.” He smiled, brushing his lips against Steve’s again.

Bucky bugged him almost daily about talking to Tony after that night. It was hard because a lot of the time Tony was working in the labs building something brilliant. But Bucky seemed to recruit Wanda and Nat in on making Steve talk, and one afternoon they locked Steve and Tony in the gym. Even Friday was in on it. Steve told Tony everything and they talked. It was good and so relieving.

“I’ll never do it again, Steve.” Tony crossed his heart. “If I do, you have all rights to punch me in the face.”

Steve laughed. He felt lighter than he had in months. “Sure, Tony.”

“So, now that I’ve got you here…” Tony glanced at the big gray doors, blocking out Nat and Bucky who were undoubtably sitting outside and waiting. “Can I ask you about something?”

“Sure,” Steve shrugged.

“You and Barnes,” he smiled. “Is that a thing now?”

Steve hesitated, a blush working its way up his neck and face. They were,  _obviously_ , but labels were…tricky. Bucky and he hadn’t decided on anything, and it’s not like they would have called themselves boyfriends back in the day. He hadn’t thought to ask either, if Bucky wanted to define them. They’d also been, uh, busy.

“Don’t tell me if you’re not ready,” Tony shook his head. “I don’t mean to pry. Well, I do. I absolutely mean to pry, but I also respect you. The closet is hard to come out of, so if you’re happy—I’m happy.”

“Tony,” Steve grinned, happy to have his friend back. “It’s fine. Yes, we’re…we are.”

“Good,” Tony nodded. “You’ve been making doe-eyes at each other for too long.”

Steve laughed, fully laughed at Tony. The door opened, and just like he thought Bucky and Nat were lurking in the hallway, waiting for them to leave. They took in the relaxed set to each man’s shoulders and shared a look.

“Glad you two decided to talk,” Nat snarked.

Things around the compounded lighted up a lot. Summer set in and things were less and less tense as the cold weather finally lifted and warmth set in permanently. Bucky and Steve continued to explore their new relationship, and Steve had never felt happier in his life. He felt grounded in a way he hadn’t before. Bucky was his best friend, always, but now he was allowed to say it. He could say and tell people that Bucky was the love of his life.

And he did.

First, he called Peggy to tell her that no matter how much he loved Bucky, she would always be his gal too. Peggy—who thankfully was having a good day—laughed at him, echoed by Bucky who was next to him on the couch. “Steve, you don’t have to spare my feelings. I lived my life, now live yours.” He may have cried at that.

Next, he sat Sam and Natasha down and told them everything—not that they didn’t know that something had started, but Steve figured they deserved a whole explanation. Then he and Bucky sat together one evening, writing out a letter to Becca Barnes about everything. How Bucky had lived, how Steve had lived, how they were now together and happy. They sent it out the following morning, and within two weeks, not only had a letter back in Becca’s handwriting that hadn’t changed in 70 years, but Becca herself was promising to come visit soon. Tony had apparently slipped the location of the compound to her somehow. Not that they minded.

She also sent along a photo she had been “keeping safe” for the past near century. It was an old photo of Steve and Bucky sitting on the porch of Steve’s ma’s house. The coloring was old and worn but clearly loved and kept safe, and the boys in it were just  _boys_. Steve was small and practically dwarfed by the hand-me-down clothes he was wearing. Bucky was just as spindly as Steve, brown hair flopping just a bit into his face. They couldn’t have been older than twelve.

Steve remembered that day clearly. It was the day they went to Coney Island alone for the first time. It was also their last day of sixth grade, and Sarah Rogers had wanted a picture of the boys looking nice before they ran off and “wrought havoc on those poor employees” on the island. It was one of Steve’s favorite memories.

“Stevie,” Bucky said, holding the picture like it was the most precious thing in the world. “Stevie how do I make this my background picture?” Steve wasn’t one hundred percent sure, so they went and found Sam, who bemusedly explained. Soon enough it was Bucky’s background; when he unlocked the phone, Steve caught an image of the drawing he made Bucky as his lock screen. Steve resolutely did  _not_  blush.

Finally, after all of that, they informed the rest of the team, which was received warmly and with much support.

Soon enough it was Steve’s birthday.

The Avengers all came out for it, bring families (Clint) or friends (Thor); so that the lawn of the compound was full of trusted SHIELD agents and families. And Becca. She came toward the evening with her youngest daughter. Bucky and she had a teary reunion that led to a moment or two of them sitting off by themselves talking about everything—Steve was dragged in later. “I knew you two would end up like this,” she said. “Never datin’ any dames. Ruthie—God rest her soul—owes me money!” Steve cracked up. It was nice, he had missed Becca.

Maria and Bruce were talking near the tables set out with plates and plates of food. Thor was drinking and joking around with his friends from Asgard, dragging some unknowing agents into the festivities. Tony had warned him that their was going to be fireworks at the end of the night because, “It may be your birthday, but Fourth of July is still Fourth of July.”

There were plenty of pictures taken of Steve and the festivities. Nat was playing a game of collecting all of them and then bombarding them to Steve. He got a really sweet one of Becca flicking her food at Bucky they way they did as kids, and Bucky sitting with her quietly near the small garden Bruce had going. There was a good one of Bucky with his arms around Steve, them smiling at each other like the world didn’t exist. That was his home screen. But he favorite was one of all of the Avengers together, cheering on either Bucky or Clint as they played a very competitive game of lawn darts. They all looked so happy. That was his lock screen. The more Steve stared, the more he realized by the angle and location, the photo only could have been taken by Fury—who had arrived, sat down, and not left the chair since. Go figure.

They brought out a two tier cake, with 98 crossed out and “32?” written below it in frosting. Inside it was colored red, white, and blue, which Bucky found endlessly hilarious. They had the cake and hot dogs. Nat managed to get squirt guns, but didn’t let anyone else get their hands on them except for the other assassins at the party. Bucky did not hesitate to use his on Steve and soak the shirt he was wearing. Steve shot him a look and Bucky just shrugged with a slide-away-smirk on his face.

Later in the evening, after Steve had changed his shirt three times, he and Bucky laid a blanket on the ground to watch the fireworks from. It only took a second of finding a comfortable position for them to wind up with Bucky’s head and Steve’s chest, and Steve’s arm across Bucky’s torso. Everyone around them had also settled in for the show.

Bucky turned his head. “Happy birthday, punk.”

“Thanks, jerk.” Steve smiled.

They were silent for a moment.

“Hey, Stevie.”

“Yeah, Buck?”

“You know,” he began. “I was reading earlier today. And it’s real interesting—did you know that a couple’a months ago they passed a law making gay marriage legal nation wide?”

Steve’s heart rate kicked up a notch. “Huh, no kiddin’?”

“Yeah,” he felt Bucky nod. “It’s been legal in New York for a while too. But now it’s national.”

“Imagine that.”  _Was he gonna—?_

“Not too long ago I really couldn’t.” Bucky said. He was quiet again, and Steve thought he’d gotten worked up for nothing. “We should give it a try.”

“What?” Steve’s breath hitched.

“Being married.” He said, plain as anything.

“Yeah,” Steve nodded numbly. “Yeah, okay. Sounds good.”

Bucky looked over, a smile on his face. “Gee, you sound real thrilled about it, punk.”

“I’m ecstatic.” Steve said blankly. Bucky laughed and rolled over, face now hovering just above Steve’s.

“I’m convinced,” he dropped a kiss to Steve’s mouth. “Forget this hero business, you should take up acting.”

“Buck, you can’t just spring this on a guy!” Steve did  _not_  squawk.

“I thought that was the point?” He grinned mischievously. “Romance and surprise and all that.”

“Yeah, well—you,” Steve sputtered. “Goddamnit, Bucky.”

Bucky laughed again. Steve couldn’t hold back his joy at the sound of that. Steve loved the way Bucky laughed and smiled so easily again. He never would be the man he was, but Steve wasn’t expecting him to be. And Bucky certainly wasn’t trying to get there. They were the same and oh so new together, blending, growing.

“I love you.” Bucky murmured.

“I love you, too, asshole.” Steve smiled brightly. Bucky leaned down and kissed him soft and sweet, everything he’d ever wanted and never thought he’d have.

The fireworks were gorgeous.

**Author's Note:**

> **Spasibo means thank you in Russian.
> 
> Wow that was a ride for my first fic in this ship! Hope you enjoyed it :D Sorry for any grammatical or spelling errors. Please leave a comment, they are my life blood.
> 
> Follow me on tumblr if you like: aceremuslupin


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